In 1-on-1 best of three games, allow recalls on third game

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » March 15th, 2006, 3:02 pm

The topic pretty much says it.

In a 1-on-1 series of best-of-3, in the third game, each side has won one game, so it would be sensible to allow recalls for each side, from the game they won.

For simplicity, we could restrict this game format to have one side be the same faction in all battles.
But the map could change for each.

Thoughts?

Dacyn · Post by **Dacyn** » March 15th, 2006, 5:50 pm

would gold carry over too?
If not this could be an advantage for factions with units which cost more than 20 gold... recruit them at the end of the first/second scenario and then recall them.
If so, I think you need to require that the first and second scenario be played with the same map and turn limit... you may need this anyway, though.

Another possible problem: whoever wins the first scenario could suicide his leader without recruiting on the second to prevent the other player from getting significant XP... that way he would have an advantage on the final scenario.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » March 15th, 2006, 10:18 pm

Or he could just WIN the second scenario, and avoid the final showdown.

Yes, there is an obvious advantage to early concession, but this is better than promoting XP milking.

Post by **Ken_Oh** » March 15th, 2006, 11:30 pm

Cool idea but I'd probably fall asleep midway through the 2nd game. Though, it does lessen the chance that someone will just "get lucky" as is Wesnoth's issue with being random.

Dacyn · Post by **Dacyn** » March 16th, 2006, 12:50 am

drachefly wrote:Yes, there is an obvious advantage to early concession

maybe you could just let the player resign if he thinks he will lose...

deonjo · Post by **deonjo** » March 16th, 2006, 3:09 am

what about the fact, that whoever wins, ussually will beat through more than 75% of the opponents units, and those that are leveled up, are ussually dead. So that the losing side is at quite a large disadvantage, when the winning team has a bunch of good troops, because they beat up the other units, and leveled up.

Post by **Dave** » March 16th, 2006, 3:40 am

I actually think this could be a rather interesting option, as long as either player can resign whenever they want in the first two games. That would make predicting one's chance of winning very important.

Of course, often if one player won the first game convincingly, they could resign the second game as soon as things start to go at all sour (or, if they won the first game sufficiently convincingly, immediately at the start of the second game). Then they will have an overwhelming advantage in the third game, and certain victory.

David

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » March 16th, 2006, 4:28 pm

Yes; it sort of imports an element of backgammon's doubling die. Not that I play backgammon.

deonjo wrote:what about the fact, that whoever wins, ussually will beat through more than 75% of the opponents units, and those that are leveled up, are ussually dead. So that the losing side is at quite a large disadvantage, when the winning team has a bunch of good troops, because they beat up the other units, and leveled up.

which is why I only suggested recalls for the third game. Then each player won one round.

One way to counter the 'resigning' tactic would be to include a monetary bonus for speed (the difference in the number of turns, say). So, if you resign right away on the second game, you've just handed your opponent a wad of gold to spend.

Post by **Darth Fool** » March 16th, 2006, 8:11 pm

Another option: let players recruit units from the game they lost, not won. There would, of course, need to be a way to resign. This would encourage resigning when you are sure to lose, instead of fighting it out to the bitter end. It would also encourage someone who feels that he is winning to attack the losing teams more experienced units instead of going after the leader, which might give that team a second chance to win.

Dacyn · Post by **Dacyn** » March 17th, 2006, 12:04 am

drachefly wrote:One way to counter the 'resigning' tactic would be to include a monetary bonus for speed (the difference in the number of turns, say).

Which is basically the same as retaining gold, which is simpler anyway...

Post by **irrevenant** » March 17th, 2006, 9:44 am

*EDIT* Oops, disregard me: I had misunderstood the idea.

Dacyn · Post by **Dacyn** » March 17th, 2006, 1:30 pm

irrevenant: huh? The only time gold and units will be retained is in the third scenario, after each side winning one scenario. How is that unbalanced?
obviously retaining any stats after just one scenario would be unbalanced...

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » March 17th, 2006, 4:39 pm

The problem with retaining gold is that you're going to either end up with this huge pot due to an 'early finish', or there's a major incentive to milk the remaining villages to get a huge pot anyway.

We don't want either of those, so I figured we'd just do it by the difference in turns. Then there's no incentive to dilly-dally.

-----

Incidentally, no contradiction arises if we let the players change faction for the second battle; but this seems to me to break the continuity of the sequence.

Dacyn · Post by **Dacyn** » March 17th, 2006, 10:43 pm

well, it depends on the turn limit...

...Basically, the difference between a "speed" bonus and retaining gold is that with a speed bonus, both players' gold are adjusted so the minimum is 100... That could either be balancing or unbalancing, depending on the context.

An advantage of retaining gold is that it is already in the game, so the player does not have to learn any new concepts...

Perhaps the best way to do it is just whichever seems more dramatic (more gold or less gold)... it is supposed to be the "final showdown" after all...

Post by **irrevenant** » March 17th, 2006, 11:11 pm

If you're going to allow people to recall units on the third turn, it's probably best to allow them to carry over all the gold (rather than normalising to a base of 100 gold) as it will enable them to recall all those carried-over units and have a battle royale.